San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1887-08-11

"NAf III AhtAb Nu'ts gou IluHN Eb W lho
ward Of st. Agnes, at the Hotel Dieu hos
| pitaL The Sisters Of Mercy viii attend to
| your wants and sec that they are all supplied
Take a good rest tonight, and tomorrow
morning.
IAN right, doctor; thank you"
Dupuytren scrubbed a few words on a slip
| Of paper and handed it TO the priest, who at
once bent his steps in the direction OF the
hospital
On his arrival there nearly the whole COM
munity came out to receive and install him in
the ward of St Agnes He was given a
neat little bedstead, with clean white sheets,
and was overwhelmed with pillows and sym
pathy. The little priest was at a loss to ex-
press his gratitude at the attention and kind
ness everybody in the place showed him.
On the following morning the 500 or COO
students that daily followed the masters les
sons had no sooner assembled than Dupuy-
tren arrived.
He straightway sought the priests bed, fol
lowed by his imposing retinue, and the opera
ton began.
Depuytren scooped out the wound and
sliced away with knife and scissors. He
sounded the sore again and again with his
steel pimcers, and recovered the fbers, which
he twisted and tied together. Then the saw
was brought into action, and portions Of the
lower maxillary bone was rasped away. The
operation lasted fully twenty minutes.
Meanwhile, the priest gave no sign of the
eXcruciating torture he must have endured.
Painting with fear or expectation, the whole
gasping crowd suddenly breathed more
freely when Dupuytren was heard to say:
"The operation is over"
Then only it was noticed that the priests
face was rather pale.
Dupuytren dressed the wound himself.
81 think all will now be well" said he, in a
friendly way. "Have you suffered muchf"
II tried to think of something else," an
swered the priest.
The patient soon fell into doing state.
Dupuytren gazed at him for moment in the
deep silence of all around him; then the great
surgeon gently sid the white curtains Of the
couch along the iron rods and continued his
ministEatiOns throughout he hospital
The priest was saved.
Every morning, as soon as he arrived,
Dupuytren, by a strange infraction of his
ordinary rule, walked past every other bed
and paid his first visit to his favorite patient
Later on, when the latter was able to get up,
Dupuytren, as soon as his clinical business
was finished, would go up to the convalescent
old man, take him by the arm and slowly
walk round with him in the ward.
Those who knew with what hardness Of
heart Dupuytren was in the habit Of treating
his patients were lost in conjecture at the
reason of this sudden change in his conduct.
As soon as the priest was able to under
take the journey he took leave of the good
sisters and the doctor, and went back to his
village friends
Not many months afterward Dupuytren,
on arriving one morning at the hospital as
usual, caught sight Of the priest, who was
already there, as he advanced toward the
ward of st. Agnes The priest still wore his
black suit, but 1t was smOthered I'm dust, and
his buckled shoes were quite white. He had
evidently come long way on foot. On his
arm was a stout willow basket with its lids
strongly strung down, and from which issued
stray bits OF straw. Dupuytren gave him
the best OF greetings, and having assured him
self that the results of the operation had gone
oil well, inquired OF the old man what had
brought him to Paris again.
Doctor" replied the priest, "a twelve
month, day FOR day, has elapsed since you
operated upon me- could not let May go
by without coming to see you, and have
brought you little present. I've put into
my basket for you two fine fowls from my
own coop, with some pears out of my garden,
because l know they are more savory than
those OF farlS But you must promise me to
taste at least something Of all this"
Dupuytren shook HIM warmly by the hand
and tried to persuade the good old man to
stay and dine with him; but the latter prayed
to be excused, though with reluctance. His
time was precious, he alleged, and he was
obliged to get home as soon as possible
Another year and yet another brought the
contents on May q, and the doctor each time
received the aged ecclesiastic with more
visible emotion
At about that time Dupuytren detected
the first symptoms OF an illness which all his
science-and it was great-could not conjure.
He started for Italy, because the whole as
sembled faculty of medicine persuaded him
IN undertake fbe iournav but ba kno,v he
hod it'll bono 70 SxTact ~, iii. 80 80 ~
naN li'''I JIi on 'ni' snug VI 'ne
improved when he returned to France in
March, 1884; but the improvement was only
apparent, as he well knew, and he felt that
the end was not far off.
His life grew darker and his hart lass ex-
,,o,,si,,, os Tho total form, Jo,,, 49,.
-" - ~ -, - -
ieiha|o III ohOSe i''O i.ieialicholy hioInehIs
the moral solitude ana isolation he had all
along SO cruelty prepared for himself, and
which now left him face to face with his APP
preaching end gave him a solemn warning
Starting I'D in his bed, he hailed his adopted
son, who was watching in an adjacent room,